f The Yorkshire Dales Deview No. 41 Winter 1992 In this issue: • Focus • Countryside Stewardship • Workshops in Folk Arts • Wensleydale Characters • Winter Reading • Daleswatch • Moneymatters • Out & About • Winter Events THE YORKSHIRE DALES SOCIETY 95p The Yorkshire Dales w$?i%iS3rw^ Deview No 41 Winter 1992 ■^./i .<W;':r. Editors: Published quarterly by Colin Speakman & Roger Oldfield North Yorkshire Marketing Ltd Production: Lambert House Phillipa Rogers and Sally Treanor Station Parade Harrogate Printed and bound by HGl IHQ Smith Settle Ilkley Road Otley LS21 3JP On Behalf of The Yorkshire Dales Society Civic Centre Cross Green © North Yorkshire Marketing Ltd Otley 1992 LS21 IHD All rights reserved. Whilst every care is taken, the publishers do not accept responsibility for loss or damage to material sent in for consideration. Views expressed in the review do not necessarily reflect those of the publishers or the Yorkshire Dales Society. YOUR VIEWS ARE REQUESTED CONTENTS Your Views Are Requested ^ This issue of the Yorkshire Dales Review is the fourth to be produced through the agreement between the Yorkshire Dales Society and North Yorkshire Marketing. Focus: The National Park Debate ^ It's been an exciting experiment, not without its problems for both partners as we've tried to get it right. Gremlins in the system have conspired to leave us feeling that much as we've been delighted with the quality and feel of the magazine, we've Countryside Stewardship in the Dales: Conservation and Access Partnership 7 yet to get it exactly right in terms of content and format, though as time goes on,(and hopefully with this issue) it's beginning to develop in the way that we hoped it might. Yorkshire Dales Workshops in Folk Arts ^2 The Society's Council of Management agreed that after four issues we should carefully review the situation to see if the new format is one that reflects the work and Wensleydale Characters interests of the Society and its members. Most people have said how delighted they are with the new-look Review, and Winter Reading commented on how much more professional it seems. However, there are a few dissenting voices from members who feel that the old formatfor all its simplicity and occasional typographical problems had a strong and recognisable identity which in Daleswatch a very real sense reflected the special qualities of the Society. Have we in fact lost that identity, and with it something of the Society's very distinctive voice,or is it that we Moneymatters have yet to adjust to the opportunity the new magazine presents? Have we got the balance of articles right? What should be the relationship, if any, with the new Out & About Yorkshire Journal,a pilot issue of which finally reached members who had requested a copy? Yorkshire Dales Society Winter Events 25 North Yorkshire Marketing, too, need to look carefully at the production and financial aspects of the Review to decide if arrangements are financially viable and suit their business. But most important of all is what Yorkshire Dales Society thinks. It is your magazine.Let us know in writing or at any YDS event. Officers or Council members would like to hear your views. Decisions will have to be taken quickly not to cause delays in the production schedule for the Spring Review, due out in April. In a very real sense The Yorkshire Dales Review is the voice of the Society. Help us to ensure that we get it 100% right! Colin Speakman Cover photograph: 'Ribblesdale' by Colin Speakman FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS...FOCUS. THE NATIONAL PARK DEBATE Dr Peter Annison, with Ruth Annison, owtis and truHiages the Hawes Ropeniakers, one ofthefew small manufacturing businesses in the Upper Dales. Responding to a recentFOCUS article in the YDS Review, he widens the debate about thefuture role ofNational Parks and the Yorkshire Dales National Parks with a thought-provoking article in our FOCUS series. Itisalmostimpossible to believe that the two articles,'Focus - Finding the Balance S^iuiniripw,j jijuc iniiii m and'Hawes Creamery - a failure of imagination'(Review No 39)were written by the same person. How can it be argued that 'to look at a typical Dales village' is 'to know you re in avery prosperous part ofEngland' and then a few pages later say about the Gunnersidc.(Jofm & Eliza Forder) Hawes Creamery closure 'Individualfamilies willsuffer inan area where there is little alternativefull-time employment,andone ofthe last real working communities ofthe Dales will watch its identity slip away as homes put on the market are bought up by communities . If conservation is too narrowly interpreted as applying only to the outsidersfor weekend retreats and tourism dominates even more'. natural and built environment, then there will be an inevitable conflict when trying One view suggests a picture of rural prosperity and contentment whilst the other to reconcile this objective with the social and economic needs of indigenous depicts a distinct lack ofjob opportunities and social deprivation combined with the communities. very real threat to the continued existence of a traditional Dales community. The increasingly vigorous local antipathy towards the National Park is a warning In truth both situations prevail within the Dales. Changes in traditional employ that this balance is not being achieved. Of course there is much that is being done in ment have left the indigenous population ill-equipped to benefit from modem-day the way of footpath maintenance, upland management agreements, tree planting, employment opportunities and the jobs created by the growth in tourism tend to be visitor interpretation schemes and so on that is admirable. There are other areas of part-year, low skilled and predominantly for women. involvement which are less satisfactory and which concern local residents. As the micro economy of the Dales has become absorbed into the wider national economy with its higher wage levels and inflated house prices, the local population Planning is being squeezed out of its homeland. What we see, during this period of transition, The National Park is supposedly a national heritage and yet we continue with the is the West Richng commuters, the incomer entrepreneurs and the inflation-proofed principle that it is the local inhabitant(or business) who has to bear the increasingly retirees providing the appearance of Dales' affluence whilst gradually displacing the onerous cost of maintaining the vernacular building tradition. This includes more diminishing band of native people. rigorous planning requirements frequently involving re-submitted drawings, delays Economic and social change may be inevitable, but there is no fundamental reason and administrative hassle, all of which adds to the financial and emotional costs. why the Dales should not retain its working communities. Indeed it can be forcefully The designation(actual or proposed)of virtually all the settlements in the National argued that without such communities, and the support, social as well as economic, Park as Conservation Areas is afurther burden of planning constraints andextra costs. that they provide to upland farmers, the broader conservation objectives of the It all adds up,in local minds,to an attempt to turn the Dales into a sterile museum. National Park cannot be achieved. The crucial question is whether National Park policies and actions are helping local Local Representation communities to survive and flourish or whether they are contributing to their decline. 'Fourteen out of24 members of the National Park Committee live in the Dales'-, The National Parks were established with two main objectives; conservation of the this is only true if we include Richmond, Ripon, Harrogate, Ilkley and Skipton. In countryside, and to enable public access. Quite separately, and at a later date, they reality only nine members live within the Park boundaries. There are therefore fifteen were required 'to have regard for the social arid economic well-being of local members making policy decisions which will not affect their own lives; only those of others. This underlines the claim that there should be greater local representation. 'It is often difficult to ensure that the voices ofthose who need to make a living in the rural community are heard above the voices ofthe environmentalists. For many people in rural areas life is extremely grim, yet their scopefor action and self-help is being impeded by measures designed to please the sensibilities ofpeople who are not themselves affected by the problems of deprivation'.(The Problems in Rural COUNTRYSIDE STEWARDSHIP IN THE DALES: Areas' - an inquiry chaired by the Duke of Westminster - September 1992) CONSERVATION AND ACCESS PARTNERSHIPS Expertise Increasingly the National Park Authority and its committee are having to adjudi cate on matters which affect the social and economic well-being of the communities within the Dales. Such matters are more properly the responsibility of the District and The problems of hillfarmers in areas like the Yorkshire Dales continue to increase, County Councils. as the GATT agreement on world trade, though welcome in many ways, indicates It is debatable whether a planning/conservation body has the expertise and even more stringent financial regimes for farmers within the EEC, which many experience todeal adequately with such issues. Indeed it is doubtful whether sufficient information is available about the complex social and economic interactions in rural people predict could make life ever more difficult for small family farmers struggling communities to allow definitive decisions to be made with any confidence. This to make ends meet in the Yorkshire Dales. underlines the need for greater local involvement and representation since this at least One possible means of albeit modest help for fanners in the Yorkshire Dales, and offers the opportunity of introducing local knowledge into the decision-making not just within the National Park, is the Countryside Commission's excellent new process.